A farmer from S. Meedhoo in Addu City says he has become the first person to grow coffee beans in the Maldives, after seven of his coffee trees produced fruit.
Abdullah Ramzy, 41, widely known as "Zuvaan Dhanduveriyaa" (young farmer), said he had wanted to grow coffee on his own land since 2020. He already grows dragon fruit and cucumbers on a large scale.
His first attempt, with a coffee plant brought from Pakistan, failed because the plant could not adapt to local conditions, he said. In 2022 he brought young plants back from a coffee plantation in Sri Lanka.
Years of trial and error
Ramzy said he first kept the seedlings in a sheltered enclosure to help them acclimatise, and only moved them into direct sunlight in 2024.
"Even out in full sun, we adjust the soil once a month to balance the pH. Last year, the trees started flowering," he said.
Flowering did not at first lead to fruit because there were no bees in the field to pollinate the plants, he said. He planted flowering trees beside the coffee to draw in bees and also tried pollinating the flowers by hand. The flowers on seven trees have since turned into coffee cherries.
Ramzy said he plans to roast the beans and taste his own coffee once they have been left for around six months. "People say it will taste better if it is grown to suit the Maldivian environment," he said.
Plans to scale up
He said each of the existing trees can be used to raise 10 more plants, and his next goal is to see whether coffee can be grown commercially in the Maldives.